Jurors: leave the information age—or go to jail

An English court has jailed a juror for contempt of court after the juror …

An English court has sentenced a juror to six months in prison for contempt of court after she performed research on the Internet and forced the abandonment of a criminal trial.

Psychology lecturer Theodora Dallas, 34, was a member of the jury in the trial of Barry Medlock, accused of causing grievous bodily harm. She looked up certain information related to the trial on the Internet, came across information concerning Medlock, and told her fellow jurors what she had found. One of them informed the judge, causing the judge to abandon the trial. Medlock was later retried and found guilty.

Dallas claims that she was searching for "grievous bodily harm"—a term of art in English law that encompasses wounding and serious injury—to learn what precisely it meant. She claims that she then added "Luton" to the search terms (the town in England where Dallas worked and the trial was being held), and came across a newspaper report that Medlock had been accused, and acquitted, of rape. Such information is not disclosed in trials lest it prejudice the jury.

Contempt of court proceedings were initiated by Attorney General Dominic Grieve. Three judges, including Lord Judge (sic; Igor Judge is an example of New Scientist's nominative determinism in action), the Lord Chief Justice, found her guilty. Lord Judge said that Dallas had deliberately disobeyed the trial judge's instructions not to search the Internet and that "the damage to the administration of justice is obvious."

This is not the only recent case of an English juror being imprisoned for misusing the Internet. In June 2011, Joanna Fraill was sentenced to eight months for contempt of court after contacting one defendant, Jamie Sewart, during a drug case, and researching another, Sewart's boyfriend Gary Knox. Sewart was acquitted early in the case, and then added Fraill as a friend on Facebook. Sewart asked Fraill about the deliberations over Knox's charges. Sewart received a two-month sentence; Knox is now attempting to have his six-year conviction overturned for jury misconduct.

Fraill felt guilty about what she had done and disclosed it to the court. The Lord Chief Justice acknowledged that Fraill had not attempted to pervert the course of justice, but nonetheless insisted on a custodial sentence to "ensure the continuing integrity of trial by jury."

Enforced ignorance

The position of the juror is a peculiar one. On the one hand, the juror is expected to draw on his experiences as a human when assessing the case presented to him. On the other, the juror is supposed to have essentially no outside knowledge, making his assessment only on the basis of the narrow set of facts presented during the trial. Simultaneously, he should be worldly and wise, but also ignorant and naive.

This has always created tensions, but they have never been more acute than today. Not only is information abundantly available—just type whatever you want to know about in a search engine of your choosing—it's expected and depended on. We don't like it when instant access gets taken away from us. The demand that jurors actively avoid informing themselves, while always unsettling for those of an inquisitive nature, has become completely out-of-step with modern life.

The blanket ban on Internet research also intuitively feels heavy-handed. Jurors in a court might well come across vocabulary and terminology that they're not familiar with; they might not know that a "caucasian male" means a white dude, or that "mens rea" refers to the guilty mind and intent to perform a criminal act. While jurors may, depending on jurisdiction and tradition, be permitted to direct demands for clarification to the judge, looking up such information on the Internet would seem harmless.

Clearly, not all Internet research is so innocuous. Learning that a defendant had previously been accused of rape, even if acquitted, may very well be prejudicial, and such findings are likely to taint the jury.

Between the two extremes of harmless dictionary-style research on the one hand and direct investigation into the defendant on the other is a world that is murky and uncertain. It would be difficult to argue that, for example, learning about the history of grievous bodily harm, and some of the notable relevant court decisions in English history, could lead to a juror making a decision that is unjust. But it might nonetheless lead them to make a decision that is different than the one they would otherwise have made.

Taking a hard line against Internet usage is the only way of avoiding "accidental" tainting. While Fraill admitted to deliberately searching for Gary Knox, Dallas did not claim to have directly sought information about Barry Medlock. Rather, she claims to have found the newspaper article after localizing her search on grievous bodily harm. Even searches that might be widely agreed to be harmless in and of themselves could reveal prejudicial information by accident.

The rules given to jurors are essentially unenforceable. Sequestration of juries is unusual. Most of the time, jurors are unsupervised when not in the courtroom, giving them ample freedom to read whatever they like on the Internet. Both Fraill and Dallas got caught only because they told other people what they had done; had they kept quiet, there would have been literally no way of knowing that they had broken the rules (especially as English jurors may not disclose their deliberations or thought processes to anyone, even after the trial has concluded).

In the world of paper research and legal libraries, fewer jurors were motivated to do the leg-work to learn about the case or its defendants (though the newspaper might pose a temptation when it provided reporting on high-profile cases). But in the modern world of search engines and Wikipedia, where similar research might be conducted routinely throughout the day—just look at how smartphone-toting twentysomethings deal with unfamiliar terms on a restaurant menu, for example—such research isn't just "not unusual," it's increasingly the norm. Against this backdrop, can courts continue to demand that jurors willingly place themselves in a bubble of ignorance, and are such demands even meaningful when they depend so heavily on self-incrimination to enforce?

I'd prefer not to see prosecutors spamming the internet with information to make the defendant seem guilty, knowing that jury members will see it. I suppose you could make "deliberate attempts to suborn the jury outside of the courtroom" grounds for mistrial. Hey, it probably already is.

There are very good reasons for having this restriction in place. If a juror can not help themselves then they should absolutely be punished. Unfortunately, the average juror is a moron who probably doesn't get the reasoning behind restrictions. Unless we reform the voire dire process -- which all too often results in juries of people too dumb to get out of jury duty -- this will continue to happen.

The fact that it may be difficult to enforce does not mean we should throw it out entirely.

As far as looking up terms goes, I was selected for a jury about two years ago and the judge in that case made it clear that we were to only use the definitions provided by the court. That way we would all know exactly what a given legal term meant according to the law. There can be many definitions on the web that get the point across as to what something means, but in a trial, precise wording is everything.

How about this? Ask someone in the court before you start researching things on your smart phone. Furthermore, everyone knows (and is explained during instructions to the jury ) not to talk or learn about the case with anyone.

There's a distinct, and good, reason for not allowing such research. There are nuances in legal circles that may not be apparent to non-lawyers, as well as the possibility of polluting the jury's standing.

A juror is chosen, to the best of the lawyers' abilities, based on observed characteristics. By introducing outside facts a juror both changes their own outlook, and fails to ensure that both the plaintiff and defendent representatives have the ability to act on any information presented.

If someone needs a legal definition, they just have to ask, at least in the US. Last time I was selected there was a legalistic phrase used that I didn't understand, and fortunately a more experienced juror had the same misunderstanding and asked. One of the lawyers explained, the other lawyer made a few comments, and the trial went on.

People need to just learn to follow directions. If they don't understand why the directions are given then ask about them; if they can't conscientiously follow them, ask to be recused as a juror.

@pusher robot: It's made very clear to the jurors why these rules are in place, and equally clear to them the likely punishment for ignoring them.

A responsible juror will understand that a fair trial is one run only on the evidence presented and not on the hearsay of someone who posted on Facebook one time (which is what it could essentially come down to).

Jurors are only human (thankfully!) but they should try to remain as objective as they can. They'd expect only the same in return, I'm sure.

Against this backdrop, can courts continue to demand that jurors willingly place themselves in a bubble of ignorance

We'll be in a world of hurt when we get to the point that people can't restrain themselves for a short period when determining the fate of another person.

You're on a jury, determining the guilt or liability of another person or organization. Suck it up and do the right thing for a brief period. You might be wrongfully accused one day, and you'll surely want the jurors to pay attention to the court room and not Nancy Grace or some other drivel.

Considering all of the stuff you can find out about someone on the internet, including past crimes that could sway jurors, I believe it to be a good idea to keep them off the internet. Adding to the fact the internet tends to be very unreliable in terms of specifics in the news (sometimes you even get many different versions of a story), your probably not getting an very accurate profile of the defendant anyways.

Your a juror, not a private investigator. Just judge the case based on the evidence your given in court.

And, again, another article by ArsTechnica showing bias and opinion instead of fact, ignoring what most of the commentors here know; that there is a perfectly valid reason behind restricting this information.

Simultaneously, he should be worldly and wise, but also ignorant and naive. ... Against this backdrop, can courts continue to demand that jurors willingly place themselves in a bubble of ignorance, and are such demands even meaningful when they depend so heavily on self-incrimination to enforce?

These lines are such bullshit. The jurors are not being kept ignorant. They are being kept from all sorts of rumor and hearsay that saturates the media during a court case. This is a good thing.

Quote:

While jurors may, depending on jurisdiction and tradition, be permitted to direct demands for clarification to the judge, looking up such information on the Internet would seem harmless.

It's not harmless because they could easily be getting definitions that are not the correct legal definition of the term. If you are uncertain of a legal term then you can request information from the court, and be certain you have the correct understanding. Looking shit up on the internet is not an acceptable substitute.

The juridical system of law that we have is an ideal and although it is hard to imagine and seemingly impractical, the pursuit of justice itself is idealistic and requires people to buy into the system and be willing to accept the burden of responsibility. Unfortunately for our society, the Honor System is hard to grasp for many people. Our media is far from unbiased and the rampancy of editorial-commentary-as-news makes outlets outside of the courtroom cesspools of misinformation.

There's an underlying issue with jurors - no one wants to be one. We're then left with a situation where the people who aren't smart enough to avoid jury duty end up on juries. Hence, we've ended up with a legal system where dumb people prejudice themselves and get to rule on someone's guilt in a trial...

@DyDx "The fact that it may be difficult to enforce does not mean we should throw it out entirely."

The fact that, without sequestration, it's _impossible_ to enforce means that it should be thrown out entirely.

The fact of the matter is that everyone now looks up everything on the internet. If you assume that a juror won't look up the defendant, you're nuts. _Of course_ they'll look up the defendant. This case is big news on the internet precisely because everyone knows its ridiculous. It fails the sniff test for logic.

Yes, there are excellent reasons to keep the jury from being tainted by outside sources with inherent biases. Oh well, them's the breaks. Jury handling needs to switch from assuming jurors are ignorant of what is freely available information and switch to assuming they already know. Does that suck for whichever party looks worse in the online media? Yes it does. But it's the only realistic approach in this day and age.

And, again, another article by ArsTechnica showing bias and opinion instead of fact, ignoring what most of the commentors here know; that there is a perfectly valid reason behind restricting this information.

I don't see anything wrong with exploring this issue. It is a growing issue as Jurors are more and more plugged in and they have to be ignorant of outside information. I do not think the requirement should (or can) go away but it certainly is an issue worth exploring.

There are very good reasons for having this restriction in place. If a juror can not help themselves then they should absolutely be punished. Unfortunately, the average juror is a moron who probably doesn't get the reasoning behind restrictions. Unless we reform the voire dire process -- which all too often results in juries of people too dumb to get out of jury duty -- this will continue to happen.

In English courts, there is no real equivalent to American voir dire. There are only narrow grounds for challenging jurors (or entire juries). Potential jurors are asked only, "Can you give a fair hearing to both the Crown and the defence?", with jurors then make a relevant religious or secular affirmation to.

'Doing research' is not a reasonable excuse for breaking the rules of the jury.

Jurors are able to ask the Clerk of the Court for advice on any aspect of the case if they are unclear. To use the example in the text, if they don't know what 'Caucasian' means they can look in a dictionary or ask the other eleven people in the room.

Since I'm a continental european where we don't believe in trying our peers, can someone from UK/US answer me a question:Can a juror ask the court to give him information about various things? E.g. something I might normally look up via wikipedia but am not allowed to. Or if I think one of the lawyer on either side talked bullshit and I want to grill him about it, to make a point more clear, can I do that?

I think it would help if judges explained to the jurors that this restriction on original research is to protect their impartiality and ensure a fair trial for the accused.

It might, but at the moment directions from the judge are widely misunderstood. I think the UK courts found that something like two thirds of jurors didn't understand the directions given to them.

I did UK Jury service last year and was the foreman on a murder case. They explained the problems with the media, in particular the internet, (because the regulated news is in a social contract with the courts but bloggers are not) and how being influenced by anything other than prepared and presented evidence is bad for the trial as a whole.

I honestly don't understand which parts of 'dont try and research the case outside of court' and 'don't discuss the case with anyone until you are in the Jury room' people could fail to understand.

Perhaps there are more complicated cases than murders which have more difficult instructions but pretty much if there is any 'difficuly' the Jury are kicked out from the courtroom until it is resolved.

In the end you are presented a list of evidence and then asked that based on the evidence you have seen in court, and no other, do you think the defendant is guilty of x charge?

These lines are such bullshit. The jurors are not being kept ignorant. They are being kept from all sorts of rumor and hearsay that saturates the media during a court case. This is a good thing.

They're also being kept from the legislative history, court precedents, basic non-legal terminology, and much more.

The British media isn't saturated with "all sorts of rumor [sic] and hearsay", because the British press is subject to substantial constraints on what it can report during a case. As a rough approximation, it cannot report anything that might be deemed prejudicial. Of course, this too is undermined somewhat by the Internet--we now have easy access to non-UK news sources that we might not otherwise have had.

If Dallas had unwittingly been using the newspaper to line boxes and come across the story by accident, she wouldn't now be in jail. She is in jail not because of what she learned. She is in jail because of how she learned it.

Quote:

It's not harmless because they could easily be getting definitions that are not the correct legal definition of the term. If you are uncertain of a legal term then you can request information from the court, and be certain you have the correct understanding. Looking shit up on the internet is not an acceptable substitute.

There are very good reasons for having this restriction in place. If a juror can not help themselves then they should absolutely be punished. Unfortunately, the average juror is a moron who probably doesn't get the reasoning behind restrictions. Unless we reform the voire dire process -- which all too often results in juries of people too dumb to get out of jury duty -- this will continue to happen.

In English courts, there is no real equivalent to American voir dire. There are only narrow grounds for challenging jurors (or entire juries). Potential jurors are asked only, "Can you give a fair hearing to both the Crown and the defence?", with jurors then make a relevant religious or secular affirmation to.

Well that is good to know, because the process in America is a joke. Simply having an education can mean you won't be put on a jury in many cases, unless this somehow suits both sides in the case. Lawyers in the US seem to specifically pick easily manipulated people as jurors and it does justice harm.

There is a correlation of use of internet searches with use of cameras in the legal field. As both become ubiquitous, we must decide to adapt the old rules to the new reality or expect a growing amount of conflict. Putting a jurors in jail is one example. Putting drivers in jail for recording a traffic stop is another.

I'm for adapting the rules but hey, putting good people in jail is another way to go.

And, again, another article by ArsTechnica showing bias and opinion instead of fact, ignoring what most of the commentors here know; that there is a perfectly valid reason behind restricting this information.

Yes, and those reasons were given in the article.

While we always try to be fair and accurate, Ars has always explicitly involved opinion and a point of view; you appear to be holding us to a standard we have never used. Peter isn't making policy prescriptions here, just raising questions to start a discussion about the role of jurors in an increasingly technical, information-rich age.

I was in just this situation several years ago. I was a juror on a murder trial, and during the deliberation I requested a clarification of the charge of felony murder. The only response I got was that all the information I needed was in the jury instructions we'd already been given, which were literally nonsense. After two days of deliberation, we had to acquit on the felony murder (at least we convicted on the burglary), but it was specifically because of the confusion about the charge, and if I had to do it again with I know now, then I would have held out for conviction.

Since I'm a continental european where we don't believe in trying our peers, can someone from UK/US answer me a question:Can a juror ask the court to give him information about various things? E.g. something I might normally look up via wikipedia but am not allowed to. Or if I think one of the lawyer on either side talked bullshit and I want to grill him about it, to make a point more clear, can I do that?

Everything the Jury sees is agreed upon by the barristers prior to the Jury seeing it. As a juror you can pass notes to the Judge and you could probably ask to see some more 'evidence' but unless the judge thought you were a flipping genius and had a REALLY valid point that the lawyers had missed then he would almost certainly deny it.

I believe that if the judge did agree with you then instead of showing you the evidence the trial would be abandoned and the new evidence would be added to a NEW trial at a later date but you would almost certainly NOT be on the new Jury.

Since I'm a continental european where we don't believe in trying our peers, can someone from UK/US answer me a question:Can a juror ask the court to give him information about various things? E.g. something I might normally look up via wikipedia but am not allowed to. Or if I think one of the lawyer on either side talked bullshit and I want to grill him about it, to make a point more clear, can I do that?

i served grand jury so my experience is probably a little different. We were allowed to ask the prosecuor questions/the witnesses questions, but the prosecutor could say we cant/wont answer that/its not important for this issue.

Im pretty sure you can ask a lawyer to explain a legal term in a normal case, but you cant 'grill' him, however if you dont think the lawyer was tellilng the truth about something you dont need to use that item in your verdict. In deliberation with the other jurors(on grand jury) we argued about the strangest things, and sometimes called the lawyer in to clarify things.

And, again, another article by ArsTechnica showing bias and opinion instead of fact, ignoring what most of the commentors here know; that there is a perfectly valid reason behind restricting this information.

This has been a trend for a long time around here. I don't know if the authors thing their audience is ignorant or if they have some agenda the need to (or are being told to) push. It's sad really... that or maybe they've realized their audience just doesn't want to think for themselves.

The best way to avoid jury duty is just to throw the summons in the trash. They don't send them certified mail, and they send out thousands of those things hoping to get a few people to respond. Serving on a jury is for people who are too dumb to get out of jury duty.

Im unsure why this matters. If a person is unclear about the term there is a way to become familiar with the term. Either ask the prosecutor/court or ask the other jurrors. Hell ask for a dictionary if you need to.There is no reason to look online, when the information can be given to you in the courtroom/deliberation room.

There's an underlying issue with jurors - no one wants to be one. We're then left with a situation where the people who aren't smart enough to avoid jury duty end up on juries. Hence, we've ended up with a legal system where dumb people prejudice themselves and get to rule on someone's guilt in a trial...

I might remark that this means that anyone who complains about messed up courts and a corrupt legal system darn well better not be one of those people skipping jury duty.

It sounds like a PITA with little pay, but I cant imagine being so petty as to think that _I_ deserve a special exemption from jury duty.

EDIT:

thesearchforbigfoot wrote:

The best way to avoid jury duty is just to throw the summons in the trash. They don't send them certified mail, and they send out thousands of those things hoping to get a few people to respond. Serving on a jury is for people who are too dumb to get out of jury duty.

Wow, really? Should we also throw out our voter registration cards, and then argue on the internet about why society is so messed up?

I'm sorry, but I don't see that this is any more of an issue in the "internet" age than it was in the 1800s when your opinion as a juror could be swayed by the local loud mouth a the pub. It's just as equally unenforceable now as it was then.

And, again, another article by ArsTechnica showing bias and opinion instead of fact, ignoring what most of the commentors here know; that there is a perfectly valid reason behind restricting this information.

I think you've got problems with impartiality, regardless of whether the author does. If you did not, you'd not take such a hard stance in your accusation.

The author isn't ignorant of the reason for restricting information. In fact, it's been noted in the article. I can't assist you with your blind disregard for evidence that should sway you to abandon your criticism.

I think Peter Bright has a valid argument here; the expectation is that of requiring blind trust in a juror to follow the rules provided to them. The fact that information is so readily accessible only compounds the problem of keeping a juror ignorant of information that would cause bias.

I don't see a practical, realistic solution aside from confinement and reduction of freedoms a juror may enjoy (which I would not agree with). This is truly unenforceable without popping the lock on a juror's privacy for the duration of the trial (which, even then, may be a useless measure since they can still look up information elsewhere).

Yes, there are excellent reasons to keep the jury from being tainted by outside sources with inherent biases. Oh well, them's the breaks. Jury handling needs to switch from assuming jurors are ignorant of what is freely available information and switch to assuming they already know. Does that suck for whichever party looks worse in the online media? Yes it does. But it's the only realistic approach in this day and age.

I'm not certain that the justice system can function under those circumstances. To take a very simple example: suppose that the police raid X's place of business and seize a pile of drugs, and X is charged with drug dealing. Prior to the start of the trial, it is determined that the police did not obtain a warrant to execute the raid, which means that all evidence from that raid must not be considered in order to protect the defendant's fourth amendment rights. If jurors cannot be trusted not to look up that evidence independently, then effectively there is no fourth amendment protection any more.

I suppose that the alternative is to require sequestration in all felony trials, which will surely make jury service far more inconvenient for everyone.

Since I'm a continental european where we don't believe in trying our peers, can someone from UK/US answer me a question:Can a juror ask the court to give him information about various things? E.g. something I might normally look up via wikipedia but am not allowed to. Or if I think one of the lawyer on either side talked bullshit and I want to grill him about it, to make a point more clear, can I do that?

No to your second question, you are not a judge nor are you a lawyer, your job as a juror is simply to listen to the facts presented and then deliberate them with your peers. Now when your deliberating you can tell your fellow jurors that you think someone talked bullshit or something like that. But if you tried to do that during the court proceedings you potentially run the risk of forcing a do over of a trail and potentially landing yourself in trouble.

As someone who has been on a jury for a serious case it is interesting to see what a selection of your peers looks like. I do want to make one quible, when someone a prosector or defense attorny asks you a question during the selection process, say: "Would the fact that the accused is reported to have used a firearm in the commission of a crime affect your judgement in any way?" Please for the love of god just give a yes or no answer. Northing is worse than hearing a soliloquy about how humans beings should have evolved past violence or that firearms are the best defense against a corrupt goverment. I swear, a question that should have taken all of 5 minutes to go through took 45 minutes because of that.

I was in just this situation several years ago. I was a juror on a murder trial, and during the deliberation I requested a clarification of the charge of felony murder. The only response I got was that all the information I needed was in the jury instructions we'd already been given, which were literally nonsense. After two days of deliberation, we had to acquit on the felony murder (at least we convicted on the burglary), but it was specifically because of the confusion about the charge, and if I had to do it again with I know now, then I would have held out for conviction.

well then the prosecution did a bad job with their instructions. It is up to the prosecutor to give you all the tools you need to convict.